The USDA lamb checkoff referendum to decide whether to continue the program is open for voting.
By law, this referendum is required no later than seven years after July 2002, when the program began.
The lamb checkoff was authorized by the Commodity Promotion, Research and Information Act of 1996. The program provides for an industry board "to carry out promotion, research and information programs designed to increase the demand for lamb and lamb products," according to a USDA release.
For the program to continue, the lamb checkoff must be approved by majority of voters.
The Dakota Lamb Growers Association has received funding through the lamb checkoff to help promote the product through their "Lamb in the Classroom" project. Begun in 1985, the program delivered lamb free of charge to as many as 23 high schools in eastern North Dakota.
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"When we teach kids to cook lamb and they move on to bigger cities, lamb is on the shelf and they can buy it," says Jim Ostlie, former president of the association.
The first referendum was passed by a majority of individual and sheep production votes in 2005, says the release. Almost 3,500 producers representing more than 5 million head of sheep voted in the 2005 referendum.
"The key to a successful referendum are the many producers and feeders that are interested enough in the industry to get out and cast a 'yes' vote in favor of the checkoff," Burdell Johnson, president of the American Sheep Industry Association, says in a press release. "If members of the industry are complacent and skip the chance to vote, a few hundred naysayers may carry the day."
Voting is open through Feb. 27 at county Farm Service Agency offices. Those eligible to vote include all lamb and sheep producers, feeders, first handlers or authorized representatives engaged in the production, feeding or slaughter of lambs during the time from Jan. 1 through Dec. 31, 2008, according to USDA.
